Attorney general
Dominic Grieve has warned social-networking sites such as Facebook could make jury trials ‘impossible’.

Attorney general Dominic Grieve has warned of the danger sites such as Facebook pose to jury trials (Pic: AP)

Mr Grieve said the temptation for jurors to research court cases on the internet had become a serious concern.

The attorney general made the comments while discussing to the recent case of Joanne Fraill who was jailed for using Facebook to contact a defendant during a trial.

In an interview due to be published in the Buckinghamshire magazine on Friday, Mr Grieve said: âShe disrupted the court proceedings in flagrant breach of what the judge had told her and she has paid a heavy price for it.

âIf we are to have jury trial, which I regard as a really key civil liberty in this country, we will lose jury trial if jurors behave in that way.

âIt would then lead to a situation where people would say it is too costly and not possible to hold a jury trial. So judges’ orders must be followed.â

He added though that he was âfairly optimisticâ that the orders would continue to be respected and jurors wouldnât try and break the law while on jury service.

Mr Grieve did suggest, however, he may intervene in future cases if court injunctions are broken online on sites such as Twitter.